Griffin: New CBA Transforms Jays GM From Artist to House Painter

The Blue Jays just got skewered. There can be no denying, by even the harshest critics of baseball, that a respectfully negotiated guarantee of uninterrupted baseball for the next five years is a good thing. After all, this is a sport that self-destructively witnessed the loss of its marquee event, the World Series, in 1994. However, as always, there are caveats.
It’s not necessarily doom and gloom for the Jays. Adjustments can always be made, but it’s clear that particular teams got screwed with the signing of baseball’s new collective bargaining agreement, the Jays front and centre among them. For two rebuilding seasons the Jays have ridden the perceived genius of young GM Alex Anthopoulos to the cusp of being a contender, turning a 28th-ranked farm system into the third-most respected player-development organization in all of baseball. The Jays’ system produced manager-of-the-year winners at five different minor-league levels this season. That’s no accident.